Sunday, March 1, 2015

Can't quite believe I'm still managing this- though I suppose 3 months isn't many is it?

It's another really quick and simple card which is great for me when I do need to make 20 Christmas cards in one night- hopefully not this year though!

Both the backing paper and topper came from a Papermania 12x12 paper pack that I had completely forgotten I had! The topper was from a sheet that had 9 different squares on it so 9 cards in an instant!

I started with a 6x6 card blank, added the cut down backing paper, mounted the topper onto red mirror card and added that to the opposite corner to the corner detail on the backing paper. Done!

Monday, February 23, 2015

I've been asked to make some Easter cards for someone at work and she wants them to have bunnies on them. This is my first one and super cute!

I started with the A5 scallop card and added a bright yellow background which I simply rounded the corners on using a punch, helping it to match the scallop base. I then hand-cut the shape of the rabbits ears but used a circle die to cut the face and glittery nose. The whiskers are made from raffia and the eyes are Card Candi. The pink paper bow is from a Craftwork Cards pad. I then added a simple message peel-off to the top corner.

Sunday, February 22, 2015

Often when someone does or says something really stupid (and I do it myself fairly often), I think that maybe they are not actually stupid- I'm just a genius!!! Maybe I'm more of an optimist than I think?

Anyway, today, I am fairly convinced that I am actually a genius!

I've been learning how to become a better colourist with the Kit & Clowder skin & hair class for the last few months. I haven't been able to give it as much time as I'd like but I can still see an improvement already.

In the classes, Alyce uses brush nib Copics as her marker of choice whereas I own the original Spectrum Noirs with the bullet nib (and no option to change them for brush nibs). It might just be that I need more practice but I do find the flicking difficult with the bullet nibs so I've been looking into the idea of upgrading to the newer version of the Spectrum Noirs that you can get brush nibs for. I though about just buying the main skin colours used in the classes but, because Spectrum Noirs are not available individually, I'd still have to buy 78 pens just to get the 7/8 main skin tones- this seems a bit silly!

This is where the genius idea occurred!!!

On the Crafters Companion website, you can buy the blender pens separately (as a gold club inspire member I can get them for £1.27 and free p&p- can't beat that!) and the refill inks. I needed some refills anyway so as well as those, I ordered one of the separate blender pens to test out my idea.

When the blender pen arrived, I carefully removed both nibs and placed them, and the pen barrel, into my airing cupboard (the warmest place in my house) for a few hours. The nibs dried out really quickly but when I replaced the broad tip and then started to colour, some of the blender remained. I removed the nib again, and put the pen back into the airing cupboard. When I tried the pen again the next day, nothing came through the broad tip so it was time for stage 2!

I then took one of my skin re-inkers and used this ink (FS4) to re-ink the (now empty) new, blender pen. I left the ink to settle for a while (2/3 hours) and then tried it. In all honesty, the ink is working better from the broad tip end rather than the bullet which is a little pale at the moment- I think this is because the re-inker ink is put into the broad tip end. When I compare the colour coming from the blender pen to the colour from my original FS4 pen, the ink colour is very similar and, if anything, the new version looks brighter and slightly darker (possibly because my original is getting short of ink anyway).

I now plan to buy a pack of the brush nibs (which can be used as replacements for the broad tip in the new Spectrum Noir barrels) and then create my own brush nib Spectrum's for just the colours I need & use.

It will still end up costing more per pen than it would if I was buying a set but at least then I can just get the colours I actually need.

I am pretty impressed with my own ingenuity! Even if I do say so myself!!!

Friday, February 20, 2015

I've managed to get in the craft room again today and have made another card. It's certainly not as CAS as my last one but was still pretty quick to put together when I'd finally chosen what it was that I wanted to use- far too many things to choose from!!!

I started with a 6x6 white card blank and the topper. I wanted to pick out the pink and green elements from the topper and bring that into the rest of my card. I took the spotty paper from Papermania 'spots and stripes pastels' pack but it didn't look right being put straight onto the base card (because of the white on white) so I mounted it onto some pink 'bling' cardstock before adding it to the card. I gutted the middle of the bling card so that I could use that to mount the topper instead of needing another piece. I layered up all of the papers/toppers and then started to embellish.

I added a Craftwork Cards striped paper bow, buttons and the green sticky ribbon to finish off the card.

Thursday, February 19, 2015

I've been busy crafting today making a card to celebrate an engagement of 2 people I work with. It's a bit of a different card style for me but I really like it and think I will be making more like this. It was super quick too.

I started with a 6x6 white card blank and a circle clarity stencil. I placed the stencil onto the edge of the card and secured it with low-tack tape, making sure to cover the other parts of the stencil so I didn't accidentally get ink on other parts. The danger with this very simple kind of card is that any mistake would be really obvious!

I inked the circle using 'squeezed lemonade' distress ink and then inked only the edges using 'worn lipstick'. Where the 2 colours have blended, a really nice orange colour has been made. I used a Clarity Stamps 'Wee Folk' stamp to stamp the couple silhouette into the circle. I then used my Cricut Explore to cut the message from black card and stuck it onto the base card.

Friday, February 13, 2015

I've made it to month 2 in the one Christmas card per month challenge!

Here it is-

It was a really quick & simple card to make (my favourite kind)!

I started with a 6x6 card blank and a sheet of Craftwork Cards Christmas 8x8 paper. The deer is part of the paper design so I made sure that when I trimmed the paper down to fit the card, I kept him in tact. I simply added the message topper and paper bow (both from the same Craftwork Cards set) to the opposite corner and then used some red stickles glitter glue onto the baubles that are hanging from his antlers.

Sunday, February 8, 2015

I've not had too much time for card making this weekend as I've had sewing projects for work to start but I've managed to make another card using one of the brilliant 'word collage' designs from the Cricut Explore!

This one uses the Jane Austen themed words which matched perfectly to a Pride & Prejudice themed decoupage topper that I've had for years (no exaggeration!).

I started with an 8x8 base card and a sheet of new Papermania 'Eau de nil' paper. I got the cricut to draw with a silver marker straight onto the backing paper which was surprisingly easy to line up. I trimmed the backing paper to size and mounted it onto the card. The topper I had already decoupaged so I simply attached this to the card with double sided tape. The two extra toppers came with the main decoupage so I added these with 3d foam to finish the card.